06 June 2008

... the nation doesn't have nearly enough public transportation to handle the new demand. Even more absurdly, right now when it's needed the most, public transportation across the land is being cut back. This is because transit costs are soaring by the same skyrocketing fuel prices that are forcing people out of their cars, at the same time transit revenues are shrinking because most transit systems depend largely on sales taxes, now dwindling as consumer purchases decline in this recession. A survey of the nation's public transit agencies released last Friday showed 21 percent of rail operators now cutting back and 19 percent of bus operators.

Even though it’s a hundred times more efficient for each of us to stop driving and use trains and buses, there’s not enough money in the public kitty for us to do so.

...they should go to Congress and ensure that public transportation is a major part of the next stimulus package.

Public transit has always been the poor stepchild of infrastructure development. America's usual answer to traffic congestion has been to add more lanes.... In recent years, only a few farsighted and ambitious cities, like Portland, Oregon, have invested in light rail.

But now that gas is $4 a gallon, all this may change. And what better way to get the economy going, and save energy and the environment in years to come, than to create a modern, efficient system of public transportation in America?